Tissue Culture Planting

[newbreed]

A bit of a late night planting frenzy!!

The new tanks needed some colour so decided to get out some tissue culture plants and do some work!

For the four 30cm cubes I used the following:
2 x Cups of Monte Carlo
1 x Cup of Crypt lutea
1 x Cup of Crypt lucens
1 x Cup of Bacopa monnieri
2 x Cups of Bacopa carolininia
1 x Cup of Alternanthera reineckii mini
2 x Cups of Rotala colorata 
2 x Cups of Green Pennywort 

Full list of available plants and details can be found here:
http://newbreedaquatics.com.au/planted-tanks/plants

These tanks will be used for guppy strains (maybe shrimp later on!) and I want them heavily planted.

Below are just some step by step images of how to use your tissue culture plants, for those of you who haven't used them before.

Step 1. Select the plants you wish to use. Determine layout based on plant growth habits and how you want it to look.

Step 2. Break the hermetic seal by opening the lid of your plants. Some may take a bit more work than others.

Step 3. Remove all excess gel from plant roots. I used a bucket of tank water and swished them about vigorously. Some plants will come away from the gel easily, some need some more effort.

Step 4. Separate your plants into planting group sizes. I prefer to plant smaller amounts per lot, spreading them over a larger area.

At this stage, I also trim the roots of any plants that have really long roots. It makes them easier to plant in.

Step 5. Using fine tooth tweezers (bent) hold plants by roots and push into soil until covered.

Step 6. You may need to push some soil back onto roots for a neater finish.

Step 7. Repeat steps 2-6 until all planting is done.

Below are the four cubes. All tanks have same filtration, heaters and Shirakura Red Bee Sand substrate. The shirakura is a shrimp substrate, not a plant substrate, I wanted to test how these plants will fair in a shrimp friendly environment. Only the lights are different, so will be interesting to see how they develop.

 

Hope this has been helpful!! ??

Edited May 8, 2016 by newbreed

[KeenShrimp]

Lol, that is awesome: 'I will just walk over to my Online Store fridge and browse which plants I think I fancy to express my creative side ' -really cool to have stuff on hand??. Like having a kitchen in a Woolies! ?

[Foxpuppet]

47 minutes ago, KeenShrimp said:

Lol, that is awesome: 'I will just walk over to my Online Store fridge and browse which plants I think I fancy to express my creative side ' -really cool to have stuff on hand. Like having a kitchen in a Woolies!

or like takashi amano used to have.... a bunch of helpers standing there handing you whatever plant you desired and trimming them up at your whim!

[OzShrimp]

I am watching this thread with keen interest to see how the lights perform!

 

Good job mate 

How often will u post updates of growth?

[newbreed]

2 hours ago, KeenShrimp said:

Lol, that is awesome: 'I will just walk over to my Online Store fridge and browse which plants I think I fancy to express my creative side ' -really cool to have stuff on hand. Like having a kitchen in a Woolies!

Having the online store has its benefits!! 

1 hour ago, OzShrimp said:

I am watching this thread with keen interest to see how the lights perform!

 

Good job mate 

How often will u post updates of growth?

I will aim for weekly, though without CO2 I don't believe we will see rampant growth.

Worst case will be fortnightly posts.

[OzShrimp]

shame you dont have a kessil :P